


String Theory

by Ttttrickster (iscatterthemintimeandspace)



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Case Fic, F/M, Prompt Fic, Red String of Fate, Soulmates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-18
Updated: 2017-10-18
Packaged: 2019-01-19 01:03:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,528
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12399894
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iscatterthemintimeandspace/pseuds/Ttttrickster
Summary: Donna had never believed in soulmates





	String Theory

Donna had never believed in soulmates. 

Even when she met and married Doug, it was because it was expected of her. Yes, she loved him, but it wasn’t like in the movies, or in the romance novels she read after he’d fallen asleep. He was there, and he treated her nicely some of the time. She knew that that was all she should hope for. 

Soulmates, as far as she was concerned, were fairytales, a myth wrapped with a bow sold to young women in the form of Rom-Coms and Nicholas Sparks paperbacks, not something that truly existed in the real world she lived in. 

Until she met the Winchesters. 

The world she had known was pulled out from under her feet by two flannel wearing, hard eyed young men, and she could never go back to what she’d known before. All the monsters under her bed were real, and they were out there. 

She should have waved it off, but she couldn’t and before long, she found herself swept up in the Winchesters’ world, hunting right alongside them and their ragtag group of allies, one of whom was God. 

Donna had never been a big believer in religion. She’d gone to church with her parents when she was younger, went for Christmas and Easter, and after she got divorced, stopped going altogether. Now, there was a man, a small unassuming man with grey flecked curly hair and the bluest eyes she’d ever seen telling her he was God, the one and only, the alpha and the omega. 

Her heart jumped, and she felt something that could only be described as a pull leading her forward, toward him. She was too embarrassed to ask what it meant, surely God had better things to do than answer her inane questions. 

She didn’t think about it again until a hunt brought it to the forefront of her mind. 

Sam and Dean had called her in on a case in Bliss, Idaho. Couples were being killed, dying at the same time as each other, with no reasonable explanation. Having ruled out vampires, werewolves, and other paranormal entities, they’d narrowed it down to a witch. They just had to find out who. 

A couple hours of sleuthing brought their list of suspects down to two, both recently divorced, unlucky in love types who might have reason to exact revenge on those who were happy. Now they had to find out how they were being killed. There were no outward signs of trauma, no bruises or strangulation marks, no sulfur. The cause of death for each victim was listed as cardiac arrest, their hearts had just stopped without reason. 

Back at their hotel, they had divvied up the research, but as always, it was Sam who came up with the answer. 

“You know anything about the Red String of Fate?” he asked, sitting up from where he’d been tipped back on the plastic hotel chair. Several hours had passed in silence, and Donna started at the sound of his voice. 

Dean and Donna exchanged a glance, and then shook their heads. 

“The Red String of Fate,” Sam read. “Is an East Asian myth stemming from an old Chinese legend. According to this, the god Yuè Lǎo ties an invisible red string to the ankles of people who are meant to be together.” 

“Like soulmates?” Donna asked, her own research forgotten. 

Sam nodded his head. “The two people tied together are destined lovers, regardless of place, time or circumstances. The cord can stretch and tangle, but can never break. It can however be cut, resulting in the deaths of both lovers.” 

“You think the witch is cutting threads?” Dean regarded his brother. 

“That would explain why they die at the exact same time, of cardiac arrest.” Sam reasoned, snapping the book shut. “Dying of a broken heart.” 

After a call to Castiel at the bunker, and an ancient chinese spell involving a goat’s heart, Donna found herself holding a pair of reading glasses that would allow her to see the red strings, so they could beat the witch to her next target. Slowly, she slipped them on, her heart pounding as the first of the crimson threads came into view. She looked down at her feet, surprised to see a thin red and silver string wrapping around her left ankle and then shooting off as far as she could see. She looked for Sam and Dean’s next. Dean’s thread was red and blue, and slightly frayed looking but it too extended off into the distance. The cord circling Sam’s leg was red and gold, looped in an intricate knot just above his ankle. The boys looked at her expectantly, but Donna didn’t say anything about it. Whoever their soulmates were, it wasn’t her place to tell them. 

“Let’s get this witch!” 

Their plan did not go as planned. They had suspected one witch, bitter at her loss of love, they had not expected two working together. Dean had gone to check one of them out, leaving Donna and Sam the other. Unfortunately, they were together, and with Dean out on a wild goose chase, Sam and Donna were at a definite disadvantage. They found themselves tied back to back with the witches leering over them. 

“We could just kill you,” one of them was saying. “But this is so much more fun, dying knowing your soulmate is dying too.” 

The second witch, a redhead with pasty skin, brandished a pair of medieval looking scissors. To Sam, they may have looked ordinary, but Donna, with her glasses, could see the faint iridescent sheen of them as they held them against her string. 

Donna held her breath as the witch began to cut, her heart beating wildly in her chest as she struggled. She would never know who her soulmate was, never feel the love she’d come to believe in, never -

She heard the snip of the scissor blades coming together, waiting for the end of her life to come rushing towards her, but nothing happened. She opened her eyes. 

The witch tried again, bringing the instrument down harder on the string, which was glowing. Still the string would not cut, even as the witch hacked at it. 

The witches didn’t have time for a Plan B, because Dean came busting in, the muzzle of his gun flashing. Each witch dropped to the floor in turn, and Donna, who had been barely keeping it together as it was, couldn’t help it; she passed out. 

She awoke warm and comfortable in the room she normally stayed in at the bunker and someone was humming. Her forehead was cold and Donna went to turn her head, to look at whoever was humming when she heard a voice. 

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” Chuck said lightly. “You’ve got a bit of a bump.” 

“What happened?” she asked. “Where are the boys?” 

Chuck laughed. “They’re fine. Went out to pick up Chinese, they should be back soon.” 

Donna took the bag of ice off, and sat up, immediately regretting her choice as her vision swam. It was then she noticed she was still wearing the glasses.

“Told you that wasn’t a good idea,” Chuck responded and she felt a warm touch on her shoulder. The nausea and pain disappeared almost instantly, and she turned to look at him. 

“They… they tried to cut my string,” Donna whipped the blankets off, looking for the cord that was tied around her ankle. “They couldn’t cut it? Why couldn’t they cut it?” 

“Ahh,” Chuck put his leg on the bed. “That would be my fault.” 

There was a glowing red cord that looked exactly like the one attached to her own leg. 

Donna grabbed at the string, pulling it and pulling it until she yanked on the end that was attached to Chuck. She looked at Chuck, then down at the string, then back at Chuck again. “How… but you’re….how is that even...What?” 

“I wish I had more to tell you. One day it was there. Chinese gods are tricky,” Chuck replied. “and I didn’t want to risk hurting you if I removed it.” 

“But you knew?” Donna wanted to know. She was fuming. “You’ve known all this time and you didn’t tell me?” 

“I didn’t want to influence you,” Chuck rubbed his neck sheepishly. “I was going to tell you…after.” 

“After what?!” 

“After...we fell in love?” Chuck offered, not quite looking at her. “You’re mad. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean… I just… how can I fix this?” 

Donna glared at him. She wanted to be mad, wanted to give him a piece of her mind, but her eye caught on the string again, the red string connecting them, the string that had saved her life. After all those years of not believing, of feeling like no one would ever love her after Doug, the universe had given her a soulmate, and not just any soulmate either. Her soulmate was God. 

She couldn’t stay mad, not with the flip flops her heart was making. She slipped her hand gently into his. 

“You could start with dinner.”


End file.
